New member and I have guinea questions!

Hi everyone! I'm new to this great forum and am so excited to find you. My aunt introduced me to you. She has high hopes for one day being a chicken owner. She did help us build our pen and run several years ago so has been living vicariously.

I've answered the sample intro questions so you can get to know us down here in northern Florida. My initial questions are about my guineas. If anyone has guineas that I can correspond with, I would appreciate it. Have some specific questions (and problems) and thought it would be helpful to get answers from this group. Thanks!

(1) Are you new to chickens / when did you first get chickens?
My father and mother were both raised on a farm and had chickens as children. Later in life they bought a farm and raised exotic birds and ratites, but no chickens. Two years ago they decided to get a few chickens for eggs and several of us got together to help them build a big house, pen and run. They started with twelve hens and two roosters, but the roosters didn't get along (surprise!). I had been looking at guineas mostly for their territorial alarms due to trespassers, so we built another big pen and got 9 guineas (8 guys and 1 girl), then put one of the roosters in there. He's happy because he now thinks he's a guinea! Would love to give him company someday to help him remember his roots.

(2) How many chickens do you have right now? 1 rooster; 9 guineas. My dad has 4 hens and one rooster.

(3) What breeds do you have? Americana's

(4) How did you find out about BackYardChickens.com? My aunt is drooling over starting her own chickens, but hasn't convinced her husband to go along with it. She got me started here.

(5) What are some of your other hobbies? Reading, writing, cooking (though I don't do so much anymore)

(6) Tell us about your family, your other pets, your occupation, or anything else you'd like to share. We do cat rescue. In our rural area there are lots of feral cats. We find them; tame them; spay/neuter them then hand them over to the local agency for placement. My daughter was my animal kid. She has brought numerous dogs into our home, a banded king snake, several parakeets, and now that she's in the Navy she's left all of her animals with my son and I. (All except Sammy the snake...couldn't do that one and found a new home for him.). As I said, my daughter's in the Navy and my son is finishing his PhD in physics soon. We live next door to my father, and in front of my sister at what we call "The Compound", a 17 acre "farm". That's about it.

What a joy to read your introduction. Love your sense of humor regarding your rooster living with guineas, and hoping he remembers his roots. There are situations where a rooster breeds with a guinea hen and chicks are produced. Though sadly they do not live till maturity. Some people call them "guin-hens," and encourage the mix just to see what comes from it. Not a good idea.

Welcome to BYC. Glad you decided to join our flock. I'm a chicken person and don't know a lot about Guineas (never had any), but definitely post on our Guinea fowl link given to you by TwoCrows and take advantage of our Guinea experts there. Please feel free to ask any questions you may have. We are here to help in any way we can. Good luck with your flock.